Posts Tagged ‘דו”חות שנתיים’

The current wave of assaults on Israeli peace and human rights organizations, intended to silence and restrict us, only convinces us of the importance of our work and of the impact it has on the Israeli establishment. In this spirit of optimism, we would like to present you with a detailed report of our activities in the past year. You can download the full report as a pdf file through this link: http://bit.ly/CWP2009

We recommend downloading the entire report, it has a lot of wonderful texts and pictures. Here is a brief overview:

1. L i f e

“To ourselves, Arabs and Jews, Palestinians and Israelis, we need to say: We must not lose hope. We will continue this struggle until the Palestinian people are free and justice is done. And to the people of Gaza and all the Palestinian people we say: Do not despair, we will end the occupation!”

– Abir Kopty, CWP activist

Actions:

➢ Stop the War on Gaza – Immediate response to the Israeli assaults on Gaza

➢ Free Gaza – Ten days of action against the siege

➢ Freedom and Justice for Gaza – Mass demonstration to mark one year to the war

➢ Stop Crimes against Women – International Women’s Day march

2. J u s t i c e

“In a capitalist world, economic activism gives us the opportunity to fight the power of capital with its own instruments, puts a dent in the smug disposition of the profiteers – and that’s very satisfying.

– Esti Micenmacher, CWP activist and member of the “Who Profits” Steering Committee

Actions:

➢ Who Profits from the Occupation – CWP’s online database about corporate involvement in the occupation

➢ The Norwegian Pension Fund – Initiating divestment from Elbit, an Israeli company that provides surveillance equipment for the Apartheid Wall

➢ Women March for the Right of Return – Commemorating the Nakba

3. V o i c e

“The most empowering experience for me was being able to talk with other women and to hear other women speaking, to think together and discuss the issues that are important for us all. I feel that political activism is a way for me to contribute to the process of freeing ourselves from the bonds of patriarchy”

“Palestinians who engage in the popular struggle are arrested and terrorized and Israelis who protest the government’s illegal policies are marked as “traitors”. The Israeli policy regarding nonviolent protest is that any opinion that does not serve the so-called “national interest” should be persecuted, silenced and quashed”

– Yasmeen Daher, CWP board member and activist

Actions:

➢ Solidarity in the Face of Political Persecution – Solidarity actions with New Profile, a CWP member organization that was harassed by Israeli security forces

➢ Stop House Demolitions – Actions against house demolitions in Silwan and Wadi Ara

5. R e s p o n s i b i l i t y

“I wish to thank your Organisation’s stance with regard to impunities and ‘war crime’ as mentioned in your letter to the UK Government. As a member of the ‘Goldstone Report’ I also appreciate your supportive comments with regard to our work and its findings”

– Desmond Travers, a member of the Goldstone Fact-Finding Mission, in a letter to CWP

Actions:

➢ Hosting Naomi Klein – A public meeting with the Canadian writer, who spoke about strategies and BDS

➢ Goldstone Report – Sending a translation of the report to Israeli officials, urging them to take responsibility for war crimes committed in Gaza

➢ Maintain Universal Jurisdiction – Initiating an urgent appeal to the British Cabinet, signed by 99 feminist organizations, to not limit universal jurisdiction

6. L e a r n i n g

“The project was eye opening with regard the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Jewish-Arab conflict in Israel. It gave them the freedom to express their feelings and opinions and many of those who had strong and one-dimensional opinions changed them a bit. The tour in Jerusalem to see the Separation Wall was especially powerful”

Dear activists, friends, and supporters,
We write these words in troubled times, as we look upon the deteriorating political reality in Israel/Palestine. The attack on Gaza in the last days of 2008 was unprecedented in its scale of death and destruction. A wave of frightening nationalism swept over the Israeli public, hand in hand with the organized political persecution of activists. Today we face an extremist right-wing government and the challenges are enormous.
The Coalition of Women for Peace does not have the luxury to give up. We have a responsibility to raise our voices and take action to end the Israeli occupation in the Palestinian Territories and to secure full civil rights for all people in this land, for a chance of a peaceful future. The partnerships between women that we established over the years across the borders of nationality, ethnicity, sexuality and class, are our most powerful asset to actively resist the violent segregation imposed on us. It is the commitment to resist the different forms and faces of racism and oppression that empowers us. Your solidarity and support is invaluable today more than ever.

This report outlines the achievements of CWP in 2008 – results of relentless and passionate work of hundreds of committed women. We are particularly honored to present the pioneering investigative project “Who Profits from the Occupation?” www.whoprofits.org. This is a comprehensive database on corporate involvement in the occupation – one of the major obstacles to Middle East Peace.

2007, the year after the Second Lebanon War, was not an easy one for the peace movement in Israel. The normalization of the 40-years’ occupation regime in the West Bank and the continuous lethal siege on Gaza, the exhaustion of peace activists and the difficulty to mobilize new ones, the rising militarism and the general distress in Israeli society, all presented a serious challenge.
In the Coalition of Women for Peace (CWP), we insisted on projecting a feminist voice against the occupation, focusing on both its disastrous effects on the Palestinian civil population, and the high moral, social and economic price paid by the Israeli society for keeping three million people under military control. It has been a year of non-stop activism
for a just peace.